


make a home out of you

by Thealmostrhetoricalquestion



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Domestic Bliss, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, M/M, Moving In Together, Oneshot, Very fluffy, just a bunch of fluff and bants guys, there's a plant, they lose all their stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-09
Updated: 2017-02-09
Packaged: 2018-09-23 04:01:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9639920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thealmostrhetoricalquestion/pseuds/Thealmostrhetoricalquestion
Summary: “There is a delicate system in place and you are destroying it, Alexander Lightwood. Unhand my pants.”“Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear you say. You’re usually encouraging me to put my hands on your pants.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know what this is. I may add to it, I may not. There's barely any plot though, it's just them moving in together, and I wrote it in an hour. I hope you like it!

“We are supposed to be doing this without magic,” Alec reminds him. He keeps his eyes on Magnus – not that Magnus minds, those eyes are definitely something to behold, and Magnus could look at them all day, every day, for the rest of his life, quite happily. Catarina always calls him an over-dramatic sap when he talks about Alec’s eyes, or his smile, or his laugh, or _any_ part of Alec, actually. Magnus doesn’t care.

“I really don’t see what the big deal is, darling, but if you insist,” Magnus says airily. He waits until Alec turns around and then he waves a hand. A cup of frothy coffee appears in his hands, the mug steaming hot, with just a touch of cinnamon sprinkled on top of the foam, the way Magnus likes it. He inhales the aroma of good, delicious coffee, eyes fluttering shut, and when he opens them, Alec has one eyebrow arched in his direction and both of his arms crossed, which is never a good thing.

Well, it _is_ a good thing. It means that all of the muscles in Alec’s arms bulge quite nicely, but it usually also means that Magnus has done something that Alec disapproves of – honestly, this could be anything from transforming the living room into a temporary ice rink, to po-going into a nearby canal whilst _mildly_ drunk. The possibilities are endless, but Magnus has the feeling that this particular brand of disapproval has something to do with the coffee.

“Oh,” Magnus says, grimacing at his mug. “The magic thing, yes. Why is that a rule, again?”

Alec sighs and stalks forward a few steps until he’s in front of Magnus, looming over him a little, and Magnus will never tire of the way his stomach twists happily at the sight of his boyfriend. And then Alec steals Magnus’ coffee right out of his hands and Magnus retracts his opinion. He could tire of it a little. Alec takes a sip, eyes smiling at Magnus over the rim of the cup like he knows what Magnus is thinking, and Magnus narrows his eyes right back.

“This is a dangerous game, Alexander,” Magnus says. “Interfering with a man’s coffee break will have dire consequences.”

Alec frowns at the mug for a moment, smacking his lips. “Has this got alcohol in it?”

Possibly. “You’re looking particularly ravishing today, Alexander.”

Alec rolls his eyes. “That’s not an answer, and I’m immune to your compliments.”

 _No you aren’t_ , Magnus thinks fondly, watching the blush rise in Alec’s cheeks.

“Besides, it’s not a coffee break if you haven’t actually done anything to _deserve_ the _break_ ,” Alec says. “Then it’s just coffee, and stolen coffee, at that.”

“I prefer the term ‘liberated.’”

“Come and help me with the living room boxes,” Alec says, ignoring this and walking away with Magnus’ mug. Magnus takes a moment to watch the way his hips sway as he walks, and then he sighs and follows him to the car.

Not a single part of him is reluctant about this, despite how he’s acting. Inside, Magnus is humming with energy and anticipation and excitement, and always this warm, surprised delight that this is _actually_ _happening_ – that he gets to _be_ with Alec, keep him and kiss him and take him out on dates. They get to wake up in the morning together, in the same bed. Magnus gets to lean against the kitchen doorway in just his boxers and watch Alec shuffle around the kitchen making coffee with the machine that Magnus bought him. They get to argue over who cooks that night, and then they get to collapse on the couch with wine and watch ridiculous movies, because Magnus likes the way that Alec gets completely enamoured with them. He especially likes finding old, shit supernatural movies and watching Alec yell at the screen because of all the inaccuracies.

 _We’re moving in together_ , Magnus thinks, and his stomach twists happily again.

He drops back down to earth when Alec shoves a cardboard box into his arms.

“Thank you ever so much,” Magnus mutters.

Alec leans over the box and kisses him soundly. “Better?”

“Marginally.”

Alec laughs as he ducks inside the car, and Magnus starts to haul the boxes towards the house. Realistically, he thinks, not much is going to change. Alec was basically already living at the apartment, there more often than not. He stayed over almost every night, and the nights that he _didn’t_ stay he spent texting Magnus once he’d finished his duties. Demon fighting didn’t get in the way as much as Magnus thought it might have, originally, and Magnus could do a lot of his own work from home. It wasn’t a problem, not the way he had anticipated it being.

That didn’t mean everything was silver linings all the time, but it’s _good_. They have something good.

 _And I’m not letting it go ever again_ , Magnus decides. He sidles through the front door and heads for the living room, breathing in the scent of fresh paint and brand new, cream-coloured carpets. It’s a semi-old house, but the previous tenants had scrubbed it up well, and Magnus had fitted the floors with a flick of his wrist, and now they have a house, clean and ready and empty and waiting to be lived in.

Alec follows Magnus in carrying two boxes in his arms, and Magnus isn’t to be outdone, and it turns into a game of sorts, trying to see who can carry the most into the house at once. It ends with boxes piled up haphazardly in the wrong rooms, but Magnus gets to see Alec’s face when he marches into the hallway with a couch that he’d conjured up balanced on one hand. It’s even better when Alec tackles him and declares him disqualified for using magic, because it ends with them lying on top of each other on their brand new carpet, kissing lazily.

“I am not a religious person,” Magnus says, as Alec sucks a mark onto his collarbone, “but even I believe that new homes should be christened.”

Alec lifts his head to shoot Magnus a look, and Magnus wiggles both eyebrows. Alec snorts, and then starts to get up, and Magus sighs and follows him, only for Alec to ambush him with another kiss once they’re standing. Not that Magnus is complaining.

“After,” Alec promises him, grinning a little. “We still have to bring the bed in.”

“But we have a perfectly good carpet right here,” Magnus says. He has to go up on his tip-toes to kiss Alec, probably always will. It always sets something fluttering in his chest, and the way Alec’s eyes darken when he does it makes the feeling a thousand times more intense. 

“We are _not_ doing that again,” Alec says, wincing. “I had carpet burn for a week, and Jace wouldn’t stop laughing at me.”

*

“Where’s the rest of our furniture?”

Magnus frowns down at his phone and sighs sharply. “I think it got misplaced. There’s a text from the delivery company saying that our truck took a wrong turn and ended up God knows where before breaking down. They said to call them in the morning and give them the address, and they’ll drive it back. Do you still have that ridiculous ban on using magic?”

Alec hooks his chin over Magnus’s shoulder. It’s awkward for Alec, because he has to bend down a little and arch his neck, but he makes up for it by folding his arms around his boyfriends’ waist and pulling him against his waist. Magnus is constructing a relatively scathing message to the delivery company, and to the truck driver, and to Catarina, for some reason, and Alec watches him with amusement before he gently prises the phone from his grip.

“Just for tonight,” Alec says. “You can go back to using it tomorrow.”

“As long as you don’t mind sleeping on the floor for the night,” Magnus says, leaning back against Alec’s chest. “If you hadn’t made me banish that couch then we could have slept on that.”

Alec smiles. They’re standing in the doorway to their new home, staring out at the street, where anyone could see them, and Alec is happy. He’s not scared, not the way he thought he’d be, and there’s this warmth blossoming in his chest that no amount of worrying will get rid of. And he is worried, about how his parents are taking the move now that it’s a _real_ thing, and about Izzy being in the Institute on her own, and about how he’s going to get there quickly if he needs to, but he’s not worried about this. He’s not worried about the new house, or Magnus, or their relationship.

“You’re thinking too hard,” Magnus tells him, still staring out at the street.

“I’m thinking about you,” Alec says quietly.

“Good things, I hope?”

“Always,” Alec promises. He presses a kiss to Magnus’s shoulder. “We can sleep in the living room, in front of the fire. It’ll be romantic. Now, come and help me with the kitchen stuff.”

*

_“All moved in?”_

“No thanks to you,” Magnus says, sandwiching the mobile phone between his ear and his shoulder whilst he wrestles with a pot plant. “You could have at least _pretended_ that you wanted to help us move in.”

“ _Oh dear_ ,” Ragnor says, in a bored tone of voice. _“Well, that sounds tedious. Do people actually do that?”_

“What, take an interest in people’s lives? Yes, Ragnor, that’s something that people do.”

“ _It sounds dreadfully dull.”_

“Sometimes it is,” Magnus agrees.

“Both of you are awful,” Alec says, as he walks past with an armful of Magnus’ clothes.

“You love it,” Magnus calls back. Then he turns back to the phone and adds, “Sometimes it’s awful and sometimes it’s just decent. Our whole moving truck’s been delayed. All we’ve got are the boxes that we managed to fit in the car.”

_“Why don’t you just conjure up some furniture?”_

“Alec asked me not to,” Magnus says fondly. “He made me promise that we’d only have furniture that we picked out ourselves, the both of us, in this house. He loves my magic, obviously, and it doesn’t extend to everything, but he wants this to be _our_ house, you know?”

Ragnor yawns. _“Not really, but then I find Shadowhunters to be strange, unnerving creatures. It must be all of those years they’ve spent wanting to kill us all. Just conjure up a bed, Magnus, for goodness sake.”_

“Well, I was considering doing it anyway, but now that you’ve ordered me too, I don’t think I will,” Magnus says, sniffing pointedly. “It’s just the one night, after all.”

“Magnus, where did you want these? In the walk-in wardrobe?”

Magnus makes a horrified noise as Alec backs into the empty bedroom with a knowing grin on his face, jackets and tights and sparkly t-shirts slung over his arms.

“I have to go,” Magnus says, panicked. “Alec is about to destroy my carefully-planned wardrobe system.”

“ _The horror._ ” The line goes dead.

“This is a rather large house, with many cupboards and closets,” Magnus states, as he comes to a stop in their bedroom doorway.

“Your point?” Alec smirks at him.

“My _point_ is, there are rather a lot of places to hide a body,” Magnus says pointedly. “Even a body as well-defined as, say, a tall, handsome Shadowhunter?”

“I had to do something to get your attention. You’ve spent the last half hour talking to Catarina and Ragnor on the phone while I unpacked most of the kitchen utensils, most of which I didn’t even know we had. We eat take-out way too often, Magnus. We’re going to get fat on noodles and prawn crackers.”

“Noodles are slimming,” Magnus lies. “And if you can eat prawn crackers on the Atkin’s diet then they’re good enough for our Monday dinners. Besides, you’re just mad because Jace laughed at you when you didn’t know what a potato peeler was.”

Alec flushes red. “I knew what it was, I just hadn’t seen one like _that_ before. And besides, Izzy usually does all the cooking, and she never let us in the kitchen. Now, do you want to tell me where to put your underwear or can I just shove it any old drawer?” He’s grinning like he knows exactly how much that sentence hurts Magnus.

“There is a delicate system in place and you are destroying it, Alexander Lightwood. Unhand my pants.”

“Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear you say. You’re usually encouraging me to put my hands on your pants.”

*

“Simon drove us all over,” Clary explains when he opens the front door, leaning in to kiss Magnus on the cheek. She’s holding some sort of cake in one hand and a gift wrapped in sparkly paper in the other. Jace is trailing behind her with his hands in his pockets, looking slightly bored, and Magnus can see Isabelle and Simon over his shoulder, standing beside the hideously-painted van.

“Did you have to park so close to the house?” Magnus asks, wincing. “That’s an abhorrent shade of yellow.”

Clary shoots him a quelling look and pushes the gift into his hands. Then she pushes past him and shouts for Alec, who appears in the bedroom doorway with a wary look on his face. He accepts Clary’s hug a little stiffly and takes the cake.

“Izzy didn’t make this, did she?”

“I heard that,” Izzy says, flouncing past Magnus with a swift kiss to his other cheek. Jace and Magnus look at each dubiously.

Jace holds up both hands. “I’m not kissing you.”

“Oh, I do believe I will pass out from the despair,” Magnus says drily. “Please, make yourself at home. There’s nothing to sit on, so you’ll have to make do with the floor.”

Sion bounces up to the doorway and holds his hand up for a high-five, which Magnus ignores. Undeterred, Simon pouts and turns to Jace, who sighs in a longsuffering fashion before smacking his palm against Simon’s.

“You even managed to make that sound sarcastic,” Simon says, shaking his head. Magnus shoos them into the house and then opens the gift, smiling softly. It’s an ornate square picture frame with a picture of Alec and Magnus inside it, from a party Magnus had thrown for Alec’s birthday last year. Magnus is slightly tipsy, leaning into Alec, who’s smiling brightly down at him, unaware that the camera is pointed at them. It’s one of Magnus’ favourites.

Alec insisted that they put the coffeepot in the car rather in the moving van, and Magnus is secretly glad because it means they have something to sway the hungry masses with. Clary clutches hers like it’s a lifeline and when Magnus raises an eyebrow at her she sighs and says, “I’m on a detox. I’ve had nothing but herbal tea for the past week and it’s killing me. I think I drowned my muse, I haven’t drawn anything in days.”

“You don’t need to detox,” Magnus says, tutting. He pours more coffee in her cup and adds, “You need caffeine. Drink up.”

“We can’t stay long,” Simon says, a little while later. He swings his keys around his index finger. “I have band practice to get to, and since none of the rest of you can drive…”

“I’ll give you the tour then,” Magnus says, clapping his hands. Alec sighs exasperatedly from the corner, rolling his eyes. “What?”

“There’s nothing to show them, it’s just a bunch of empty rooms,” Alec says. “The moving van isn’t here and it won’t be here for a while, so it’s literally just empty rooms. What’s exciting about that?”

“Nothing,” Jace agrees.

“Everything,” Izzy argues, rolling her eyes. “It’s all about vision, about seeing what could be there once all of your stuff arrives. Magnus, show me around, I want to know what you plan to do with the place. I’m assuming you’re not going to ask Alec for help with the décor.”

“I would, if I wanted everything to be one shade of grey,” Magnus concedes. He pulls an apologetic face at Alec, who simply shrugs, agreeing.

*

They end up sitting cross-legged on the living room floor. Most of the other furniture is arriving tomorrow, so Alec’s propped a radio up on a cardboard box, and they’re listening to a slow, crackly jazz song. Magnus can recall fond times, sitting in smoky bars, bathed in lilac light and watching an array of men and women croon into microphones, dressed in smoking jackets and velvet gowns. _This_ , though, this is better.

Alec keeps glancing up from his take-out container of noodles to smile at Magnus, a thoughtful look in his eyes.

“Everything alright, darling?” Magnus asks. He’s surrounded by small square cushions and candles, dressed in a silk kimono and black boxers, and the living room is bare, as is the rest of the house, but it already feels like home. “Or are you just admiring my impressive physique?” Magnus gestures at himself with his chop-sticks, and Alec follows the movement with his eyes, a fond, wry smile playing about his lips.

“Well, now I am,” he says agreeably. Magnus pops a dumpling into his mouth and grins cheekily. They eat for a moment, enjoying the quiet, and Magnus digs around in a nearby box and unearths a stack of extremely old magazines that he and Catarina have doodled on over the years. He pops the elastic band holding them together and picks one at random, chewing on another dumpling as he snorts at their inane comments on ‘modern’ fashion.

“Actually, I was just thinking that you look happy.”

The magazine is forgotten, as is the food. Magnus empties his hands and then crawls the remaining distance across the piles of blankets and cushions until he’s almost in Alec’s lap, and then he tangles their hands together.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You’ve lived in your flat for a long time,” Alec points out, although he doesn’t look upset or worried. He’s simply stating facts. “I thought you might miss it, at least for the first night.”

Magnus looks from his magazines, to the radio, and then back up to Alec, who blinks back calmly.

“It was just a building, Alec, and I brought everything I love about that flat with me. There’s nothing to miss.”

Alec ducks his head, but Magnus can still see the small, pleased smile growing on his face. “Even without any of our furniture?”

Magnus glances around the empty house and smiles. It’s not the couch or the dresser or the type of stove the buy. It isn’t the colour of the throw pillows or the thickness of the rug in the hall. It isn’t even the bed they share, with the His and His pillows that Izzy bought them a week ago, partly as a joke and partly as a house-warming gift. It’s not the flat in Brooklyn and it isn’t the Institute that Alec grew up in, and it isn’t even this house, with its brand new lights and squeaky wooden floors and unblemished walls. It’s not where they live.

He’s made a home out of Alec. Hollowed out a space in a chest that carries more love than it can bear. Not content with concrete structures, Magnus has let his taste run towards sweeter, thinner bones that hold this man up, and he exists comfortably in the space left behind.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Alec asks, lowering his chopstick slowly.

“I love you,” Magnus says. “Even when we don’t have furniture, even though you would have painted our house black given the chance, and even though you didn’t know what a potato peeler was. I love you.”

Alec snorts. “How romantic.” Then he softens, and adds, “I love you too.”

Magnus kisses him, and it feels like coming home.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I really hope you liked it. I might add a few more chapters with domestic-y scenes in, if you'd like that sort of thing, leave a comment or a kudos! Thank you! :)
> 
> @thealmostrhetoricalquestion on tumblr :) Come say hey!


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